Travels And Aviation NEWS: 1. Philippine leader vows to open up aviation sector

1. Philippine leader vows to open up aviation sector
SINGAPORE — Philippine President Benigno Aquino has vowed to open up his country's aviation sector to foreign competition in a bid to boost tourism, and appealed for greater Singaporean investment.
Speaking to business leaders in Singapore, Aquino said his government was finalising a decree that will allow foreign airlines to fly to major destinations in the country.
The executive order "will liberalise the entry of foreign carriers in a way that will not decimate our local carriers," said Aquino, who was elected nearly a year ago on promises to reform the economy and tackle corruption.
"Under this order, we will allow foreign carriers to fly into key destinations in the Philippines."
The Philippines has lagged behind Southeast Asian neighbours in the race to attract tourists despite boasting white-sand beaches, exotic diving spots and other natural wonders, partly because of poor transport across the archipelago of more than 7,000 islands.
Aquino also said he had given aviation officials one year to resolve issues that led Europe to ban Philippine carriers from flying to the continent and prompted a downgrade by the US Federal Aviation Ad

ministration (FAA).
"We are also addressing technical and regulatory issues that have been allowed to worsen in the previous decade. This led to the banning of Philippine aviation into Europe and the downgrading of Philippine carriers to category 2 under US FAA regulations," said Aquino.
"Once these bottlenecks have been resolved we will embark on an aggressive marketing campaign that will brand and sell the Philippines as a key tourist destination in the outside world."
Philippine carriers were stopped from expanding services to the United States in 2008 and banned from Europe in March 2010 over concerns airline safety was not in line with international standards.
Aquino also urged Singaporean businesses to take part in the Philippines' growth story.
"We invite all of you to be part of our own reconstruction. Your government has already signified its willingness to help a brother nation reach the same heights that you have reached," he said, noting that his country grew 7.3 percent last year.
Aquino is the son of Philippine democracy champion and former president Corazon Aquino. He won the May 2010 elections on a platform to fight corruption, which has plagued the Southeast Asian nation for decades.

2. Aviation Authority reopens airport

HE Civil Aviation Authority of the Philippines (Caap) announced Thursday the opening of the Zamboanga International Airport (ZIA) runway to air traffic after it was closed for a day.

Caap closed the ZIA runway to air traffic Wednesday after a Manila-bound Airbus A320 of the Philippine Airlines (PAL) with flight number PR-124 was stuck in a mud at the end of Runway 09 while preparing to take-off.

3. AirAsia X Adds Airframe MRO at LHT Philippines

Long-haul, low-cost carrier AirAsia X has decided to renew a supplemental airframe maintenance agreement with Lufthansa Technik Philippines in Manila, covering light C checks on its Airbus fleet. The extension suggests Lufthansa Technik Philippines’ tactics for retaining the region’s low-cost carriers as customers are working.

The new contract expands a three-year base maintenance agreement signed last year, which already provided C checks, a heavy maintenance check, cabin retrofits and painting services for nine AirAsia X Airbus A330s and two A340s.

In announcing the extension, Anaz Ahmad Tajuddin, head of engineering for the airline, says that “The teamwork and partnership we receive from Lufthansa Technik Philippines has ensured proven reliability of our aircraft thus far.”

When Aviation Week spoke with Tajuddin last October, he described his strategy for airframe maintenance as an area where he sees opportunities for cost advantages (O&M, November 2010, p. 22.) In the past, he said, AirAsia X sent C checks to Sasco in the Philippinnes, but in 2010, it sent all six C checks to LHT Philippines.

At the time, he said he was still in discussion with MROs for 2011 arrangements. “We do not keep all of our eggs in one basket,” he said. “By doing that, we keep the MROs on their toes.”

But LHT Philippines has been making moves to retain work for low-cost carriers, whose numbers are growing rapidly in SE Asia. To meet customer needs, Lufthansa Technik Philippines planned to convert one of its hangars into an LCC operations center, VP marketing and sales. “We have to align our business to these guys to really support them in what they are doing.”

4. Jinggoy wants CAAP probed for corruption

The Civil Aviation Authority of the Philippines (CAAP) should be probed amid allegations of corruption within the agency, Senate President Pro Tempore Jinggoy Estrada said Tuesday.

“I think the time has come for the Senate to look into the situation at the CAAP and whether the law creating it needs further refinement or whether those mandated to implement it are just bungling their jobs," Estrada said in a statement on Tuesday.

Estrada, the son of ousted President Joseph Estrada, said there were reports that a syndicate within the CAAP and the lax implementation of the law by its officials have allowed the proliferation of fake pilot licenses.

“What is also bothering me is the possibility that some foreign nationals, especially those from the Middle East and licensed by the CAAP as pilots, would later turn out to be members of terrorist groups as what happened before," he said.

The senator cited Mohamed Atta, who reportedly took flying lessons in the Philippines in 1999 and later on took part in the September 9, 2001 World Trade Center attack in the United States.

“These allegations were largely from the previous administration, and we are now trying to correct it," Napoleon Garcia, CAAP deputy executive director and officer in charge told GMA News Online over the phone.

Garcia, who was designated OIC by the Department of Transportation and Communications, said he and the current batch of CAAP officials led by executive director Ramon Gutierrez, who is now in Europe for a conference, were appointed by Malacañang only last January.

Taking people off sensitive positions

“With these allegations, we are now trying to remove people from sensitive positions. ‘Yung may mga (Those with) complaints," he said.

He said the head of the Licensing and Certification Department had already been replaced.

“But the other complaints surrounding the disappearance of millions of pesos were allegations about the [past CAAP] administration," Garcia said.

The CAAP was created by Republic Act No. 9497 in 2008, specifically to bring the Philippines on track with international aviation safety standards and certified by the Federal Aviation Authority of the United States and the International Civil Aviation Organization (ICAO).

Still, the Philippine remains far from getting certified because of non-compliance with global best practices and safety regulations, . "Almost two years after the creation of the CAAP, our situation is basically the same."

By
Neha Jain

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